If you are buying a used car, you should first read my June 4, 2012 posting, Used-Car Buying 101. The information here applies to buying either a new or used car—specifically the negotiation part--and has been said elsewhere.
First, do not allow a car salesman to begin the dialog by asking, "How much are you prepared to pay per month?" If you answer that, you will not get a good deal, and you very likely will end up paying more than the figure you named.
Second, have an idea of what your credit score is. Then go to a credit union and see what interest rate you'd be able to get from them. Go into the car dealer armed with that offer of a finance rate and see whether the dealer is able to beat it. He has his sources of financing, and a car buyer with an excellent credit score is in a good position to bargain for the finance rate.
But that is the last step. First you and the dealer (or salesman) must agree on the price. Remember that they do this all the time, and in fact for a living, and they have a bag of tricks up their sleeve. Be armed with figures for what you should be paying for the car, and be prepared to spend several hours with back-and-forth offers and counter-offers. The salesman will keep disappearing after you name a figure, telling you he has to get approval from his sales manager. This may be more tactic than fact. But stick to your guns as to what you think you should pay, and be prepared to walk out if they're not willing to bargain. Anyone who lives in an urban area with multiple dealers for that make can threaten to go elsewhere. Also—did you know you can even do some of your car shopping by phone? You can call around and ask for quotes—though some dealers will refuse to name any numbers over the phone.
You can also solicit price offers on a car via the Internet. I think the site in question is carbuyer.com.
Copyright © 2013 by Richard Stein
Sunday, January 20, 2013
Saturday, January 5, 2013
What Is College For?
A few days ago I was again watching the PBS TV program called "Moyers & Company," which is an interview program. That episode's guest was a man called Junot Diaz, who is an author and teaches Creative Writing at MIT. Aside from much of interest in the man's background or personal story, my attention was caught by a (perhaps somewhat incidental) observation he made about a change he has observed in college students over the course of the 20 years he has been teaching.
He said that students today all seem like MBA students; that they are working for a piece of paper like one that would gain them admission to a medieval guild.
In other words (and as he himself said), parents who send their kids to school today are not doing it to build character or maturity or wisdom, or for the sake of any such changes between their temples that might be looked for. Rather, they are there just to be able to get a better job. I, let it be said immediately, am a firm believer in "liberal education." (Does one even hear that term anymore?) That is, I am of the school (no pun) that believes that what education is about is things like learning how to think logically and critically, gaining an appreciation of thousands of years of human cultural advances, and so forth. That is, gaining what once were called "humane values."
If I had the opportunity to talk to Mr. Diaz myself, I would have had to chime in with the fact (or opinion) that it's not just a phenomenon of the last 20 years. When I first taught in a collegiate institution, I found the same thing—and that was 45 years ago!
So I would agree that there definitely has been a change in our society's view of college and in its expectations of college. But I have some ideas as to the cause.
First: In the 1960s and into the 70s, in the era of the "counter-culture," student protests against the Vietnam War, and so forth, students were (among other things) fighting for "relevance" in their education. That evidently meant no more "dead poets"; no more history. We want to learn about today's world, we have no interest in (or respect for) the past—including both history and writers of past ages.
Then again, there has been a big change in who goes to college. It's not just the children of well-to-do families, who might be sent to college to acquire a bit of culture before going into the family business or becoming doctors or lawyers. More students—including very many of the young people I was teaching—were the first in their families to go to college. The parents of these young people were sending their kids to college so that they would earn more money. A BA equals dollars: it's that simple.
You put the two factors together, and what you've got is, students from working-class or lower-middle-class families go to some school beyond high school and they want to become system engineers (whatever that is) or network managers—to get a good job in IT or some such field where no one cares about your pedigree. So—don't teach me history. Don't teach me literature. Just the courses directly relevant to my future career. Anything else is a waste of time.
Copyright © 2013 by Richard Stein
He said that students today all seem like MBA students; that they are working for a piece of paper like one that would gain them admission to a medieval guild.
In other words (and as he himself said), parents who send their kids to school today are not doing it to build character or maturity or wisdom, or for the sake of any such changes between their temples that might be looked for. Rather, they are there just to be able to get a better job. I, let it be said immediately, am a firm believer in "liberal education." (Does one even hear that term anymore?) That is, I am of the school (no pun) that believes that what education is about is things like learning how to think logically and critically, gaining an appreciation of thousands of years of human cultural advances, and so forth. That is, gaining what once were called "humane values."
If I had the opportunity to talk to Mr. Diaz myself, I would have had to chime in with the fact (or opinion) that it's not just a phenomenon of the last 20 years. When I first taught in a collegiate institution, I found the same thing—and that was 45 years ago!
So I would agree that there definitely has been a change in our society's view of college and in its expectations of college. But I have some ideas as to the cause.
First: In the 1960s and into the 70s, in the era of the "counter-culture," student protests against the Vietnam War, and so forth, students were (among other things) fighting for "relevance" in their education. That evidently meant no more "dead poets"; no more history. We want to learn about today's world, we have no interest in (or respect for) the past—including both history and writers of past ages.
Then again, there has been a big change in who goes to college. It's not just the children of well-to-do families, who might be sent to college to acquire a bit of culture before going into the family business or becoming doctors or lawyers. More students—including very many of the young people I was teaching—were the first in their families to go to college. The parents of these young people were sending their kids to college so that they would earn more money. A BA equals dollars: it's that simple.
You put the two factors together, and what you've got is, students from working-class or lower-middle-class families go to some school beyond high school and they want to become system engineers (whatever that is) or network managers—to get a good job in IT or some such field where no one cares about your pedigree. So—don't teach me history. Don't teach me literature. Just the courses directly relevant to my future career. Anything else is a waste of time.
Copyright © 2013 by Richard Stein
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